ZEW Discussion Papers
Gender Wage Differences in West Germany: A Cohort Analysis
Fitzenberger, B. und Gaby Wunderlich (2000), Gender Wage Differences in West Germany: A Cohort Analysis, ZEW Discussion Paper No. 00-48, Mannheim. Download
A comprehensive descriptive analysis of gender wage di erences over a long time period
is missing for West Germany. Using an empirical approach which takes into account
explicitely changes of wage distributions for both males and females as well as life{
cycle and birth cohort e ects, we gobeyond conventional decomposition techniques
of the average gender wage gap. The paper provides some stylized facts of the level
and dynamics of the gender wage gap from 1975 { 1995. The empirical analysis is
based upon the IAB{Besch.aftigtenstichprobe. Our ndings con rm the importance of
distributional e ects relating to skill level and employment status. While life{cycle
wage growth is in general much lower for females compared to males, comparing their
estimated time trends implies that the gender wage gap has narrowed substantially in
the lower part of the wage distribution especially for low{ and medium{skilled females
but much less so in the upper part of the wage distribution. Surprisingly, we do not
nd any cohort e ects for wages of female employees.
Keywords: Gender Wage Gap, Quantile Regression, Cohort Analysis
